Mapp and Lucia - E.F.Benson

I always enjoy an old-fashioned English comedy, and whilst not in the very top rank (Wodehouse, Grossmith, Jerome) this was lots of fun. I particularly enjoyed the unlikely finale, involving a floating dining table and a sought-after lobster recipe.

Wodehouse did keep coming to mind, and the comparison was instructive. Wooster gets to hog the narrative voice which makes him much more sympathetic than the competing heroines of this tale. The effect is to make this feel more satirical rather than collusive, which politically should be more appealing to me but somehow doesn't quite achieve the same comic brilliance.

Thanks to Liz for the recco.